Style 2000

Forward thinking

Cars that phone home, walls that move and fabrics that make us run faster: technology is about to change the way we live. As London focuses on innovation, with the opening of 100% Design and London Fashion Week, we offer a glimpse into the future...

Imagine this. You tell your curtains to close, and they do so. Your washing machine orders parts for itself when it breaks down. And the walls of your sitting room can move back and forth. Sound like a bad acid trip? Well, if you believe Neil Spiller, a senior lecturer in architecture at University College London, these innovations could soon be coming to a home near you.

According to Spiller, the author of a book called Digital Dreams: Architecture And New Alchemic Technologies: 'We're at the most interesting point for architecture in the last 100 years. With computing power doubling every 14 months at no extra cost, we can start to sew it into the surface of buildings to create "interactive-response architecture".'

The possibilities are endless: doors that open with the help of a retinal scanner rather than a key; lamps controlled by robotic arms, so they follow you around; and furniture made of latex and 'muscle wire', which changes shape to hug the body of each new user.

Similarly mind-blowing notions of the home of the future are on show until 5 October at New York's Museum of Modern Art, in an exhibition called The Un-Private House. It includes a conceptual project devised last year by the Manhattan practice Hariri & Hariri. In the Digital House, interior and exterior walls are made of liquid-crystal-display (LCD) blocks, which can offer a range of functions to enhance daily living. Information about cooking, for instance, can be shown above the kitchen worksurface, while the bedrooms are equipped with devices that allow sleepers to record and replay their dreams.

Another of the projects exhibited - Frank Lupo and Daniel Rowen's Lipschutz/Jones Apartment - has actually been built. The couple who own it are both Wall Street traders, and in order for them to keep up with stock-market movements around the world, there are computer screens throughout the flat. There's one next to the bathroom mirror, which can be consulted while you are shaving. There's also one by the bed, which no doubt means that Lipschutz and Jones can synchronise their love-making to the ups and downs of the FTSE 100.

For many, being reminded of work when you are brushing your teeth seems like the ultimate nightmare. While most of us won't be eager for an LCD screen to be installed in the shower, William Russell, of the London architectural practice Adjaye & Russell, is sure that within a few years, mainframe computers for houses are going to become as common as televisions. 'They will operate everything in the home,' he predicts. 'They are very expensive now, but for top-level jobs, they're what clients are asking for.'

What seems certain is that, increasingly, the objects within our homes will interact with each other. 'Design nowadays is more about creating experiences than it is about objects,' affirms Tucker Viemeister, head of the industrial-design division at Razorfish in New York. He is talking about things such as your car phoning your house to let it know you're on your way home, or your coffee maker being linked to an electronic calendar so it knows not to make an espresso for you if you're away on holiday. These things, he says, could be with us in the next three years.

The technology used to create such wonderfully wacky 'experiences' is called Wireless Application Protocol, or WAP. 'WAP,' Viemeister is convinced, 'will bring about bigger changes than the Internet.'

Others are not so sure. 'People have a healthy resistance to gadgets,' insists architecture's Mr Minimalism, John Pawson. 'I don't think the home will be full of them,' agrees London-based architect, Pierre d'Avoine, who recently won the Concept House 1999 competition for his vision of the terraced house of the future. 'There will be invisible technology. Environments will keep their ordinary facades, but technology will be built in.'

Even a techie like Kevin Warwick, professor of cybernetics at Reading University, is not certain what the public is ready to accept. He has developed a robotic security guard for the home, but asks, 'Do people want things moving around their house at night?'

At Philips in the Netherlands, enormous research is being carried out to find out exactly which innovations would be welcome. 'The process now is validating what is acceptable on the marketplace,' says the company's design director, Stefano Marzano. 'How far are consumers ready to embrace hyper-intelligence? What kind of intelligence do we want objects to have?'

Listen to Daniel Libeskind, the Berlin-based architect behind The Spiral, the celebrated extension for London's Victoria & Albert museum, and he'll tell you that fascination with technology and gimmicks is on its way out. 'Technology should not be an end in itself, but a means to an end,' he says. 'People will just lose interest in technology if it overshadows the human and imaginative space of architecture and desire. People don't want to live in the experimental world of technicians, but in a place that deeply concerns the stability of the human being.'

He is convinced, though, that technology will change the shape of buildings. 'Frank Gehry is only just scratching the surface,' he says, referring to the American architect's amorphous Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao. The technique used by Gehry came from the aircraft industry, and consists of a robotic arm tracing the form of a hand-made model and then relaying the information to a computer. It allows buildings of almost any shape to be made, and Pierre d'Avoine, for one, believes that 'exotic' forms will soon be more widely adopted for private homes. 'There will be an openness for something other than box houses,' he says.

Boxes, it seems, are on their way out across the board. 'Computers have to stop being black boxes and pay more attention to who we are and what we want to do,' say Chris Pacione and Chris Kasabach, of the visionary design house Sandbox Advanced Development. They are thinking not only of the curves and colour overload of the iMac computer, but of something more radical.

A few years back, they were asked by Intel to come up with their vision of the computer in 10 years' time. One of their solutions was Digital Ink - a computer in the shape of a pen. They see no reason why hi-tech devices shouldn't come in the form of everyday objects. 'All projects are cubes, because all the components, such as the chips and circuit boards, are cubes,' says Sandbox's CEO, Astro Teller. 'Yet objects can take any form. We are no longer limited by technology.'

At Philips, Stefano Marzano is also keen to combat the dehumanising nature of hi-tech objects, and talks about devices for the future that are 'intelligent, but also caring. Vases could contain not only water and flowers, but also software,' he suggests. He also imagines a hi-fi system in the form of ceramic pots, and television remote controls integrated into the arms of sofas.

IDEO Product Development in London has designed a computer in the form of a plant and a printer disguised as a drawer. They have also come up with the Kiss Communicator, which allows you to blow a kiss to your beloved, even at a distance of thousands of kilometres. Sensors in the handheld device pick up your kiss, transform it into a colour pattern and transmit it electronically to your partner's device. As it lights up, your partner knows you are thinking about them. 'It's very playful,' says IDEO's Matt Marsh. 'It's about taking the technologies and working out ways we can delight people.'

Integrating technology into haute couture is the goal of French designer Olivier Lapidus. For years, he has been working with research laboratories to present a new innovation at each season's catwalk show. In the past, these have included fabrics made of flowers and plants, as well as dresses incorporating solar panels and wearable computers. 'Innovation will be incredibly important for fashion in the next 10 years,' he predicts. 'Styles will be dictated by technological breakthroughs.'

In the media lab of the Massachusetts Institue of Technology (MIT), researchers are working on a whole range of mind-boggling 'wearables'. So far, they have managed to make keyboards from conductive fibres that can be put through the wash, developed a lapel pin that doubles as a camera and microphone, and come up with wearable electronic navigation aids, which are currently being tested by the US Army. In the future, they imagine tourists wearing them to find their way in a city.

Meanwhile, Sandbox Advanced Development has created an offshoot called Bodymedia, which is working on ultra-chic and wearable health monitors. 'Our aim is to become the Swatch of health monitoring,' says Astro Teller. The goal, it appears, is to bring a bit of hip to health-related devices. What looks like a sports top, for example, actually has a mini-computer and sensors built in, which can monitor everything from your respiration and heartbeat to your skin temperature. Through a two-way pager, it sends signals to the Internet, which can then be accessed by your doctor to check whether you're in fine fettle. The company also plans to make stylish rings that can tell you whether you're stressed, and to turn the hearing aid into a covetable fashion item. What's next? The designer colostomy bag?

Health-related issues are clearly on the minds of manufacturers at the forefront of textile development. 'Smart' fabrics that protect against harmful ultraviolet rays are already available, while others are marketed as 'anti-bacterial' and 'anti-stress'. 'Stress is static electricity which builds up in the muscles,' says Thomas van Cauwenberghe, from the Belgian fabric manufacturer Sofinal. 'Anti-static yarn such as carbon fibre is incorporated into materials, takes out the static in your body and helps you relax.' Sofinal has also developed a remarkable 'auto-regenerating fabric'. You can make a hole of up to 1 sq cm in it and then repair it by simply rubbing.

Other textile manufacturers are concentrating on developing fabrics that keep body temperature constant, whatever the weather. Schoeller Textiles in Switzerland has come up with ComforTemp - a material in which there are microcapsules that absorb your energy if you are too hot, and store it. 'When you are too cold, they release the energy and heat you up,' explains the company's vice-president Christine Jenny.

A similar temperature-regulating fabric called 'ceramic polyester' has been developed by fashion designer François Girbaud. He is currently developing textiles that allow you to introduce substances, such as beauty products, to act on the skin. They will be made of hollow fibres, into which you can insert the desired liquids. The same principle has already been used by the MIT media lab to develop fabrics that change colour. 'You have hollow fibres with electronic ink in them,' explains MIT professor Alex Pentland. 'When you apply small charges to the fibres, the ink changes colour.'

Guillaume Tiberghien, from Paulbonte Technical Yarns in northern France, imagines fibres that will act as artificial muscles, even further into the future. 'They will contract or elongate at the same time as your own muscles and provide you with extra strength,' he says. No doubt they will prove particularly popular with 21st-century Tour de France cyclists!

The development of wild and wacky materials, however, is not a domain exclusive to the fabrics industry. Daniel Mason, of London screen printers Artomatic, has started to work with 'plastic paper', a futuristic, white polyester film. The Australians have started printing money on it. However, despite his dalliance with polymers, Mason believes 'people will go away from plastics in the next five years'. John Pawson agrees: 'The more technology there is, the more people will need to find a refuge from it. More people will value materials such as stone, wood and water.'

Ecological considerations will inevitably influence design in the near future. 'Architects will have to move towards non-technical solutions which don't consume energy,' predicts Daniel Libeskind. Architect Pierre d'Avoine believes that buildings of the future will be heavily insulated with organic products, such as shredded newspaper and sheep's wool, and that the majority of houses in 20 years will be fitted with photovoltaic panels, which convert solar energy into electricity. John Pawson believes that sound pollution will increasingly become an issue. 'There will be more emphasis on places to escape to - quiet places in public spaces. I think technology will also gradually make machines quieter,' he says. Anyone for a silent pneumatic drill?

Sound is just one of the things on the mind of Geoff Crook, who runs the Sensory Design Research Laboratory at Central St Martins, in London. For him, the future of design should be multi-sensory. 'As human beings, we have at least five senses,' he says. 'However, contemporary design is generally just visual. Everywhere you look, even in architecture, there is a lack of tactility, audio design and aroma.'

He plans to remedy this by having different smells piped into homes, doorknobs made out of new tactile, sensuous materials, and sounds we like automatically played as soon as we arrive home. Crook also believes that companies could market their identity through other means than image. One of his students, for example, has worked with Tesco to produce its own brand smell.

Crook himself has developed a sensory-led concept to replace aisles in supermarkets. It consists of snaking glass walkways with water flowing underneath. On either side are tiered plastic display mounds that emit the smells of the produce on them when touched.

Whatever the future of supermarkets, the future of homes is sure to be about versatility and flexibility as both a reaction to the increasing speed of change in our lives and the collapse of the nuclear family. Adjaye & Russell is currently working on a versatile building in Brick Lane, east London, in which the ground floor and basement can either be a photographic studio, a separate apartment or part of the whole house.

In the architect Rem Koolhaas's much-lauded Maison à Bordeaux, sliding screens fitted into ceiling tracks can be shifted and artwork displayed on them to change the look of the space. As for John Pawson, he predicts that more sophisticated ways of plumbing will allow water to be delivered to every part of the house and thus blur the distinction between different rooms. 'We'll have water in our living rooms and bathrooms that are places to spend time in.'

A number of exhibitions in the UK this week give a further insight into the homes of the future. At the 100% Design exhibition at Earl's Court (23-26 September), Jam Design and Communications have collaborated with Whirlpool and Corian to present a vision of the kitchen of the future. It includes a versatile refrigerator, in which various sections can be closed down.

'Most people go shopping once a week,' explains Jam's Jamie Anley. 'So, by the end of the week, there's almost nothing left in the fridge and you're uselessly consuming energy to cool down empty spaces.' In the future, he envisages food being delivered to houses the way mail is, and deposited into a chute that will lead directly into the refrigerator. He also confidently predicts that 'light bulbs will be obsolete in three years' time' - to be replaced by light-emitting diodes and luminescent panels: 'Lighting will all be integrated, and you won't need any wires.'

Whether or not we do away with Edison's invention by that time, lighting possibilities will certainly increase in the next decade. At the cutting-edge Designers Block show at Bishopsgate Goodsyard in Brick Lane this week (23-26 September), the German company Kombinart will present a lamp whose light source is an LCD screen. In the future, John Pawson imagines plaster walls that can take an electrical charge to make them glow.

For the Homes For The Future expo in Glasgow (until 24 October), Habitat's Tom Dixon came up with large, colourful lights that can be joined together to act as room dividers. Versatility is clearly a major preoccupation of furniture designers. For the Glasgow show, Ron Arad has created inflatable seats that can be transformed into different shapes by vacuuming, and One Foot Taller has come up with a lounge chair that can be expanded into a sofa of variable sizes.

At 100% Design, young designer Fiona Davidson will present 'Room Project 1', a system of six pieces of furniture which fit together into a box shape. The function of each piece is deliberately blurred. You could either sit on them or put things down on them. You can also create different shapes by slotting together various pieces. 'It makes the user think,' declares Davidson. 'You become more aware of the space you're creating when you move these things around.'

Renny Ramakers, co-founder of the ultra hip Dutch cooperative Droog Design, predicts there will be a greater interaction between users and objects in the next few years. 'There may be products which are not finished, for example, and which the user has to complete,' she says. 'Thus, the products will become part of the user's identity.'

Already, motorists can change the colour of their Smart cars with adjustable panels, and customisation of products is becoming increasingly available with every day. The North Carolina non-profit research lab TC2 has developed a complex version of an inkjet printer using a dye that won't stain or fade, which will allow people to custom-print their clothes. It also invented the 3D body scanner that has been installed in a new Levi's store in San Francisco. The machine takes your body measurements in a matter of seconds. They are then sent to the factory, and within a couple of weeks, you have your own tailor-made jeans.

Ramakers foresees a backlash to globalisation, with designers reanalysing their own regional identity. 'Everything is now looking the same. There are the same shops in New York and London,' she laments. 'I think designers will start placing much more importance on regional qualities and traditions.' She also believes there will be renewed creativity, and certainly more choice.

'We're on the verge of the century of eclectism,' says French designer André Putman. 'With minimalism, we have banished any deviation, anything amusing. Design has become a sort of dictatorship, in which people choose objects simply out of snobbism. My greatest hope is that people will understand that a house can only be beautiful when it resembles themselves. For me, there is going to be a renewal of charm.'

Putman's scenario seems plausible, but who knows how design will really develop in the next 10 years? As John Pawson says, 'The design of the future is like sharks. The only thing we know about them is that they are unpredictable.'